


Beached Hams

by Jenaime_PaslaPlage



Category: The Simpsons
Genre: Crack, M/M, Steamed Hams, TOO MANY COMMAS, Ugandan Knuckles - Freeform, aurora borealis at some point, disturbing imagery of trains, i am sorry for being a disappointment, incorrect everything, incorrect geography, incorrect science, just pretend this doesnt exist, on a surfboard, the beach, they get lost at sea, unfortunately, violence towards seagulls
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-26
Packaged: 2019-04-05 13:49:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14045592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenaime_PaslaPlage/pseuds/Jenaime_PaslaPlage
Summary: Skinner and Chalmers go on a misadventure across the ocean, essentially abandoning the schoolchildren on their beach field trip for several days.





	1. Chaptwer 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a sad attempt of a crackfic where they go to the beach and various things happen 
> 
> I feel slightly bad because i started writing this pos nineteen dickety two million years ago and even then ugandan knuckles was loosing its... steam, so including the echidnas was my first mistake, even though they're adorable, finishing the fic so late was another mistake, and mistake number three is actually posting it. 
> 
> i mean i'm not late-late, i'm just very extra-extra fashionably late-late, there's a difference in there somewhere

One day Principal Skinner went to the far end of the beach.

The field trip had only started ten minutes ago and the children were already re-enacting their favorite episodes of Itchy and Scratchy. Seymour couldn't have walked away fast enough. Sometimes the only healthy and/or legal way to deal with your problems is to pretend they don't exist. The anguished screeches barely detracted from his self imposed ignorance, he was quite used to them.

He eyed a nearby hamburger stand and momentarily stopped to purchase some, then continued walking (see: escaping) but some strange inkling made him pause and take a closer look at his soon-to-be lunch. The hams, he realized, didn't have any condiments, onions, lettuce or even bread. They were also notably raw. 

He turned back, prepared to give the small business owner a piece of his mind and to demand a possible refund.

The stand had disappeared in a cloud of dust right along with his unconventional life goal of having a decent lunch. His troubled gaze drifted once more to the hams. The only way to salvage this dire situation would be to cook them himself, he decided.

 

Right, grilling some hams, this certainly wouldn't be the first time he'd had to disregard everything he'd ever learned from the cooking channel.

First, he would need to build a crude grill, the only material available being sand. He had absolutely no idea of how to accomplish this. Seymour scanned the beach, hoping to find some kind of inspiration, in the shells dotted about the ground or in the nuclear waste that carved streams through it, he wouldn't know until it struck him upside the head. 

He brightened up almost instantly when his eyes caught on a small red mammal, an echidna, his mind supplied. It looked like the type of creature that would feature prominently as the mascot of some highly successful DIY company. 

In that moment he knew, that if he had to, on fear of death, ask anyone/thing how to build a grill... he'd ask this little guy about it.

He made his way over to where the fuzzy animal stood. It would be swept away in the tide if it didn't move soon, so he hastened to pose his enquiry.

Seymour hadn't even opened his mouth, but the critter replied anyway,

"You do not know de wae," 

he tried to appear unfazed

"No... I was... actually hoping you could tell me how to build a grill," the echidna sneered at him, then spat on him for reasons unknown to the principal.

Well damn, he sure wasn't going to get any guidance from this particular echidna. He turned instead to ask the other one that had been standing behind the first.

"I was hoping... uh... do you by any chance know how to build a grill?" 

It refused to answer.

He stepped forward to ask the next in line. Same result. Skinner was not in the mood for a failed social experiment.

A line of echidnas had formed, spanning about three miles in a near perfect line that ran almost parallel with the equator, only slightly off by a forty five degree angle.

Skinner asked each one if they knew how to build a grill.

 

Finally, after being clucked at one too many times, he decided to simply put the hams on the ground, figuring that it would be much easier than trying to construct a grill out of sand anyway. As he did this he felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up as if-

 

"SEYMOUR!" -as if a violent storm were imminent.

 

"Superintendent! I hope you're prepared for an unforgettable... barbecue," Seymour smiled, attepting to deflect scrutiny from his obvious lie. 

"Eh," his attempts were in vain,

"Superintendent I was just-"

"What are those hamburgers doing on the floor, Seymour?" his boss pointed redundantly at the hams that were lightly steaming as they baked in the sun. Another three days and they would be moderately safe to eat, although somewhat fly ridden.

Skinner's eyes resembled those of a deer caught in the headlights of a freight train "I was just- uh... building a ham castle! Orthographic architecture! Care to join me?"

This was it. His whole career tied to a stake as an angry mob approached with their flames and many, many pitchforks. 

Skinner's smile faltered as he fought to keep it as genuine as possible. Nothing was _impossible _per say, but some goals were more realistic than others. He clung desperately to the 'other goal' as extreme levels of doubt settled in.__

__

__"Meh," and on that note, Chalmers trudged away, most likely to go surfing or whatever he did on weekdays. They had been acquainted for twenty gruelling years and Skinner still wasn't quite sure. It was highly suspect how he'd shown up to supervise _this_ field trip to the beach, but had been completely absent last month when they'd visited the museum of cardboard boxes, Skinner had invited him himself! Nothing goes wrong at the box museum, that was his motto anyway._ _

__The principal mopped his brow with a janitor grade mop that had probably been lying there on the beach for quite some time. His heavy sigh abruptly cut off as he stumbled forward from the immense force of a wave crashing into him. The off-blue water rushed past, dousing the grilling hams. There had been no time to react._ _

__"Oh egads my hams are ruined!" His wail echoed around him as he wondered, what would he do now? He had just given Chalmers an indirect invitation to lunch! The nearest Krusty Burger? Seven point three miles East. Nearest Krusty Krab? Seven point three miles below sea level. He spotted a seafood restaurant a short walk away and immediately dismissed it, remembering how Chalmers had avoided even looking at the fish in the school cafeteria._ _

__His gaze wandered to the gift shop that sat next to the disregarded restaurant_ _

__"But what if..." he trailed off, thinking how to best articulate his complex thought process "...I were to purchase a rubber chicken and hope he doesn't notice? Oh ho ho. Delightfully devilish, Seymour," that had taken fifteen minutes and he wished there had been someone there to hear it, excluding you-must-know-who-by-now-surely._ _

__He'd gotten halfway through pretending to jump out of a window when he heard something. It sounded like a quack. Skinner, a man who liked ducks, halted his window hopping and turned, only to find that the superintendent had returned from surfing, or whatever he did on weekdays. Skinner couldn't begin to guess, even after twenty-_ _

__"Why are the hamburgers still on the floor, Seymour?" he asked, then stage-mumbled "does he really expect me to eat that..?"_ _

__"Um."_ _

__Chalmers huffed, clearly enamoured with his explanation, and turned three hundred and sixty degrees, then, realizing his mistake, turned a hundred and seventy-nine and wandered in a curved line back towards the location of what was probably a surfboard._ _

__"Phew," Seymour untied his frilly but unfortunately imaginary apron and jumped out of the... window and hit the ground running as fast as he could to the gift shop, breaking the world record for 'fastest sprint to a gift shop' in the Guinea pig World Records. It didn't count for much as no one had bothered to record it, he did earn many odd stares, however._ _

__

_\-------------  
_

__  
"Superintendent, I hope you're ready for mouthwatering... chicken,"

__

__

__No one answered._ _

__"Chalmers?"_ _

__The sun had almost set, painting the beach in an unfamiliar light. The children had stopped shrieking. He turned every which way, looking for some sign of life. The world had seemingly abandoned the beach, making him feel almost as though the world had abandoned him, too. The superintendent backing out of their kind-of deal also left Seymour at a disadvantage. How would he get rid of the fake chicken now, when he couldn't even let go of the outdated ideology that littering was wrong?_ _

__

__He stared at his shoes in contemplation, they were so last decade... out of the corner of his eye he spotted something stirring in the water, a sight more concerning than his sheer loneliness and outdated footwear. A neon blue color, barely visible in the foam, soon gave way into a troop of aquatic subspecies echidna trundling out of the water, dragging the lifeless form of the superintendent behind them._  
_

__Skinner rushed over and immediately checked for a pulse, Chalmers had always been difficult to him personally, but was actually rather lenient compared to other superintendents he'd heard horror stories of. Each second his boss remained unconscious, the odds of Seymour losing his job permanently increased by fifty percent._ _

__"He did not know de wae," the echidna in front, most likely the leader, chanted in way of explanation. Skinner half-nodded but secretly thought it to be quite lame._ _

__"Stand back," he didn't want to preform CPR, he'd forgotten how anyway, but he had to try. He knelt down and repeatedly punched Chalmers in the ribs, the first step if he remembered correctly. He didn't. It felt more like punching a wall. Seymour angrily fished whatever was obstructing him out of the offending pocket, procuring a bottle._ _

__He squinted at the label._ _

__Pills._ _

__Of course. Who needs the kiss of life when they've got medication? Not the superintendent, that's for sure. He threw a glance over his shoulder at the blue echidnas, who were watching a bit too intently._ _

__"He needs his medication," he said in way of exaggeration._ _

__The echidnas took this as a threat to their culture, the only thing -anyone- should need being The Way._ _

__"Brudas watch out. Dangerous man," the leader announced, pointing at Skinner "spit on hem!"_ _

__The principal wiped spit off his brow and dumped the contents of the bottle onto his boss._ _

__"SEYMOUR!" 'Thanks so much for saving my life, Seymour,' 'You're the best, I owe you one, Seymour,' 'Please autograph my face, Seymour' were all things he would have preferred hearing over: "I AM _OUTRAGED_ THAT YOU'VE JUST WASTED ALL MY MEDICATION!"_ _

__"Superintendent! You didn't have to go to all the trouble of regaining consciousness," 'just breathing would have sufficed' he mentally tacked on, wiping more spit off his brow. The echidnas had not ceased their antics and the ocean had risen several feet above its previous level in the past minute alone._ _

__Skinner and Chalmers tried to reason with them._ _

__But the echidnas still wouldn't stop, in fact the spitting only grew more rapid-fire. Finally one discount platypus stepped forward,_ _

__and started clucking._ _Faster than humanely possible, more of the creatures emerged from the sparse bushes and started to spit to the beat of their national anthem. One of them going so far as to start handing out spears._ _

__Skinner and the superintendent were going to drown very soon if they didn't think of something. After a few minutes of standing and staring at each other a light bulb went out over Seymour's head, signalling that he'd just had an idea. He turned to his boss, ignoring the confused expression on his face and set his plan in near literal motion._ _

__"You get the surfboard, I'll get the hams. Three two one go," he said quickly in a rush._ _

__"Eh-" his boss began to protest but then cut himself off and complied, most likely figuring that there would be plenty of time to fire Skinner later._ _ __Seymour waded as fast as he could to the last known location of the hams, once there he searched frantically in the murky spit water. He'd grown inexplicably attached to the ruined hams. A sort of kinship. They were also alone in the world._ _

__"Some hams, some hams, my school for some hams," he pleaded to fate, before his hand collided with a circular object. The hams! He grabbed it and lifted his arm in triumph,_ _

__Only to find a sand dollar in his palm. He hurled it away. It hit Chalmers in the face. Seymour paid no mind as he'd already found another unidentified round object._ _

__He held it up to the low light and shook his head, throwing the gold coin away as if trying to throw his disappointment with it. It hit Chalmers in the face, Seymour paid no mind, elated as he finally found what he'd been looking for._ _

__The hams! He almost threw them away on muscle memory before catching himself._ _

__

__The sea level had risen to the point where he had to walk en pointe to breath. Sometimes he wished he'd taken swimming lessons instead of showing up to work._ _

__"SKINNER!"_ _

__"Superintendent I was jus-" he gurgled,_ _

__"Just get on so I can fire you later," Seymour gulped, being fired was a worse fate than death but he complied because he felt that he deserved it. He took the proffered hand and climbed onto the green-ish surfboard._ _

__

__He shot one last look at the beach, now a swirling mess of water, spit, and toxic green sludge. He hugged the hamburgers to his chest before setting them aside so he could help paddle away into the sunset, a cunning strategic move to prevent the tribe from following them. Echidnas had bad eyesight, if he remembered correctly, and today had certainly reassured him of his adequate memory._ _

__Seymour heard them shouting their war cries and didn't dare look back._ _

__

__The troop of echidnas plunged into the ocean._ _


	2. Chaptwer 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Skinner finally catches a fish.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is probably the worst chapter but also the shortest which automatically makes it better than the others

Sleeping on a surfboard had been trying, to say the least, in fact, he'd only gotten about three minutes of shut eye in the whole ten hours they'd been lost at sea. It was morning now and Chalmers had somehow managed to nod off. Seymour's shoulder hurt a lot but he didn't move an inch in fear of incurring his boss's entirely misplaced wrath. 

"SKINNER!" 

Had he spoken too soon?

"Superintendent I was just-" Seymour glanced at the crude driftwood fishing rod he held, 

"I was just... fishing for compliments!" he said finally, adorning what he hoped to be a winning smile. He absolutely did not bat his eyelashes.

"Eh."

"Phew..." he pouted and recast the line. There was too much salt in the air, he could feel it burning his larynx.

"Seymour?"

"Superintendent I was j-"

"Why is there smoke rising over the horizon, Seymour?"

"Oh, that isn't smoke, that's steam. Steam from the steam engines they have in Sodor,"

Chalmers donned the expression of someone who'd had their entire world turned upside down.

"STEAM ENGINES? IN THIS YEAR?" the principal didn't know why he was so upset, 

"Ye-"

"IN THIS DAY?"

"Y-"

"IN THIS PART OF THE OCEAN?"

"-"

"LOCALIZED ENTIRELY ON THAT ISLAND?"

"Yes!" Seymour jumped at the sound of his own voice. 

The superintendent simply turned around, the furthest distance he could get from Skinner. He utilised his arm as an oar, the sooner they found non train infested land the sooner he could increase that distance.

"Phew,"

Seymour didn't see so much as he instinctively _knew_ that a pair of eyes had narrowed at him.

 

A few hours later, after they had passed Sodor and been temporarily accosted by a blue steam engine, something finally tugged on the hook he had fashioned out of a rogue soda can. Seymour quickly reeled in the shoelace-line, only to find a dead fish at the end. An off white seagull swooped down next to the surfboard, flapped its wings and returned to the sky, a fresher fish fighting valiantly in its beak.

Seymour glared at the aerodynamic show off with disdain. He held up his own sub par catch and poked his boss-soon-to-be-loss harshly on the shoulder to get his attention, figuring that he was good as fired anyway. He was promptly glared at with disdain.

"Superintendent, I hope you're ready for mouthwatering... fish,"

"I thought we were having steamed hams?"

"You leave the hams out of this!" 

"Myeh,"

They ate in moderate silence, only pausing to discuss the moral implications of leaving the school children unattended on their field trip.

His boss stopped talking and gazed at the fish as if he could see their futures in it "you know, this fish is quite similar to a textbook image of the third stage of decomposition," as accurate a prediction as any. 

Seymour looked down and muttered for a while before his attention was seized by something moving in the distance.

In the murky depths of the spit puddle, a neon blue mass advanced towards their general location, slightly off course by thirty nine degrees.

"GOOD LORD, WHAT IS THAT?" Chalmers pointed and attempted to stand up on the surfboard but ultimately thought better of it.

"Aurora borealis?" Skinner guessed dubiously. 

"Don't be ridiculous Seymour. It's obviously just a blue whale," he said, trying to hide a laugh behind his hand, Skinner's unwavering incompetence never ceased to either annoy or amuse him.

Seymour nodded distractedly, keeping his eyes trained on the sub-marine shadow.

 

Halfway through their third game of imaginary chess (it being quite difficult as they couldn't see the board) bubbles started to rise unnoticed from the spit puddle. The principal honestly felt so attacked, he knew that it was the whole point of the game, but did his opponent really need to be so vicious? Just when he felt as if his heart couldn't break any further, the superintendent had to prove him wrong. 

"Your queen is out of commission," 

Skinner made to reply but was instead interrupted by a cacophony of clucks.

A booming omnipresent voice deafened them "PROTECT DA KWEEN!" it commanded.

Blue echidnas started swimming to the surface and spitting into the air causing it to precipitate heavily on the two unfortunate unintellectual individuals. 

As the amphibious mammals closed in on them, Seymour, made a split second decision and snatched the imaginary queen from the board, throwing it into the churning waves. The horrible creatures dived for it, giving the humans ample opportunity to paddle away. And paddle they did.

 

The leader of the tribe held up the queen and roared triumphantly before pausing to scrutinize it.

"Wait a minute, this is a fake kween!" a chorus of angry clucks skimmed the spit water, traveling to the farthest reaches of the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the 'at this time of year/day' part didn't turn out very well


	3. Chaptwer 300

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Skinner and Chalmers fall off the surfboard

They floated along peacfully, bored out of their fucking minds. Several hours had passed since the last echidna fiasco and nothing life threatening or interesting had happened since then, unless you counted the small incident in which they had waved for help at a passing speedboat. The occupants had simply waved back and laughed at them. Chalmers asked Skinner if those were the four delinquents who attended Springfield Elementary, the principal had quickly reassured him that it was only a passing resemblance and that everything would be okay. 

 

"Seymour-"

"Superintendent, I- I was ju-"

"What's the point of having radical skills if you can't show 'em off?" he nudged his subordinate "Let's go surfing,"

Skinner pointedly shifted his gaze to the surfboard they currently sat on as his answer. 

Chalmers scoffed "I guess 'surfing' must be what you call 'sitting' over in Albany?" Seymour lowered the fishing rod. 

"Yes," over the years his boss had called it Alabama, Alakazam, Albeany, even Almond on several occasions but never Albany. He donned a genuine smile as his culture finally got the recognition it didn't really deserve and didn't really need... It was the thought that counted.

While he contemplated his hometown, the superintendent had stood up on shaky legs.

"Superintendent, we've gotta find a door frame there's an- oh," he went back to fishing with a blank expression. However, the immense weight of his embarrassment for mistaking mere jitters for an earthquake was just enough to tip the scales, or rather, the surfboard. 

As luck would have it, they both managed to grab hold of the surfboard, just in time as neither of them had ever bothered learning to swim. 

The superintendent spat, then retched when he remembered what the ocean now consisted of and proceeded to yell on reflex.

"SEYMOUR!" 

"Superintendent I was-" he hacked and coughed "I was just-"

"Why did my surfboard spontaneously tip over, Seymour," he said in a non questioning tone as if he had all the answers in the world. Well he didn't, Skinner had made sure of that when he distributed those fake cheat sheets in '85. He made doubly sure in '86 too.

"Uh... it didn't tip over it was just doing a barrel roll," Seymour explained away with a wave of his hand, mentally cackling when his boss seemed to buy it, figuratively. He then cringed, abruptly remembering what had become of the ocean; the one he was currently submerged in, not the one on Mars.

Their frantic efforts to haul themselves back onto the surfboard ultimately amounted to a parody of a seesaw, or rather, a seasaw, weighed down as they were. Echidna spit actually contained trace amounts of lead that, when combined with sodium chloride, made more lead. 

For millennia, since the first simple plank of wood hit the waves, surfboards have been designed for buoyancy. The same could not be said for the school faculty.

"Use your legs!" they almost had it, almost. Skinner paused and turned his head.

Hearing the distant clucks made them forget all about the dangers of staying in the water too long. A race against a different kind of death took priority in their minds instead.

"Sey-"

"GET PADDLING! I mean Superintendent, I was jus-" Chalmers had taken Skinner's floundering as an opportunity to splash spitwater at his face, like spritzing an annoying dog.

"Superintendent did you just-" he wheezed,

"Yes. Now, Get. Paddling, Skinner," he said in what an untrained ear would interpret as a normal voice, To Skinner it was just quiet shouting. 

 

It took three hours for them to paddle away far enough for the clucking to fade into background noise. For now they were safe and were fast approaching a landmass off in the distance. If all the time spent staring blankly at the globe in his office had taught Seymour anything, it was that the center of the USA was actually located in China and also that they were nearing the island of Uganda, the echidna homeland.

A few months prior the elusive continent had mysteriously uprooted itself and moved (across land and sea) half way into the Pacific ocean. It had been all over the news, or what little he could catch of the news before his mother changed it to the sports channel. 

Guard towers dotted the coast, utilised to keep out dirty foreigners such as himself and Chalmers. They'd need to play their cards right, (all four queens would do the trick) if they wanted to bypass the tribe and travel inland. Seymour knew that echidnas were a purely coastal species. His 'friends' at university had often mocked him for writing his thesis on echidnas, but who was laughing now? Those judgemental frauds were probably drowning in spit. 

Seymour smiled brightly at the thought.

If the two of them were lucky enough, they could live out the rest of their lives in the Ugandan jungles. As pitiful and contradictory as it was Skinner actually wanted to survive. 

 

They paddled on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> they are on a surfboard in the middle of the ocean and skinner's main concern is the earthquakes


	4. Chaptwer 4 million

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Why do they run?

A crowd started gathering on the beach as the two plus surfboard neared, painting the entire shore blood red. 

Skinner and the superintendent quickly discussed their infiltration plan, only making a few minor death threats to each other before coming to an agreement.

Before long, crimson arms were reaching for them, spit and clucks alike filling the air. Chalmers looked about ready to scream like a little girl.

Skinner pointed behind the tribe "LOOK OVER THERE, THE QUEEN!" he all but hacked up a lung. The discount platypus squadron turned as a single unit, trying to catch a glimpse of the queen. The humans took the opportunity to creep past the tribe, only stepping on a few of the lower ranks.

Sprinting into the jungle using the surfboard as camouflage turned out to be easier than expected.

Seymour snickered "like stealing candy from a baby," 

"The last time you tried to steal candy from a baby you had a black eye for two weeks,"

"How was I to expect him to have such a strong uppercut?" he stared unfocused at the foliage of a nearby bush. 

"Why exactly, were you stealing candy from a defenceless child, Seymour?" Chalk asked, muttering the only word he could think about Skinner right now; "disgusting," 

Seymour paused.

"You're the one that dared me to do it!"

Chalmers paused.

"It was a joke!"

It hadn't sounded like a joke at all. He briefly considered punching his boss as compensation. Deciding to save that drama for later, he dropped the subject and motioned to keep walking, they had to find shelter.

 

And with that thought, rain fell in sheets so heavy that there was more water in the atmosphere than actual air. Monsoon season must have started early on the New Continent.

By unspoken agreement they continued forward, hoping to bump into a cave or fallen tree, as they couldn't speak nor see at this point.

 

After wading through enough mud to build two artificial mudslides, they actually did bump into a cave. It was quite dark and foreboding but at that moment it looked about as welcoming as a cat café.

They collapsed exhausted at a far wall and settled down for what would undoubtedly be a long wait, downpours like these could go on for days, sometimes weeks without end.

 

The rain abruptly stopped.

"Oh for the love of-"

"SKINNER!"

"Superintendent I was-"

"Will you calm down for once?!" 

Seymour breathed out slowly "it's just that... why do bad things happen to good..." he glanced towards Chalmers, then to himself "why do bad things happen to people?"

His boss gave a noncommittal shrug. The principal sighed and turned his attention to the world outside the cave. The rain clouds had just cleared, revealing the sun already in the process of setting. How many times a year does that happen? Under normal circumstances, Seymour would too busy passed out on the kitchen floor after drowning his sorrows in the highly irradiated water found in Springfield to notice such things.

He did however notice the cold. Although they were in Uganda, its coordinates on earth had changed significantly, its latitude several paces further from the equator than before, making the average temperature at night around -23F. 

It was cold and the only thing he could hear was silence.

 

"Remember that time we had to eat a whole cake in seven secon-"

Skinner scooted away imperceptibly and scowled "you stop that train of thought right there," he would of admonished far more if not for the ground shaking. Pieces of the cave ceiling fell on his head.

 

He was about to suggest that they find a door frame when a broken whistle sounded out over the Ugandan jungle, putting the local fauna to complete and utter shame.

 

Next were chords played in an eerily distinctive tune. If only he could remember where he'd last heard it...

 

Sodor.

The train had followed them.

The two... men desperately took every measure so as not to be detected by the cerulean-blue-steam-powered-locomotive, such as ceasing to breathe, move or even think in case it was psychic. 

Seymour mentally wished that he could sink into rock like he'd seen Homer Simpson sink into shrubbery on occasion, but not too loudly, as the train was still too near for him to think at a normal volume. 

After several minutes that felt like hours to their oxygen deprived brains, the disturbing music finally stopped. They gave in to the demands of their lungs, it took a little while longer to work up the courage to open their eyes.

 

The train sat just outside, staring at them.

 

After they had stopped screaming and recovered from most of their blood being replaced with adrenaline, which took about an hour, Skinner opened his eyes again, only squeaking in horror once. He took a closer look at the train engine, confirming that it was not able to come in after them. He laughed at it, but then stopped after a second, realizing something. He turned to his boss, who shared the same look of terror he could feel on his own face.

 

It could wait there for days, until they were delirious from thirst and starvation, by which time they would unwittingly mistake its retched maw for the gateway into hell. The hams were smoked in hell but they would hardly care at that point.

They had to get out of there.

 

After staring blankly at the train, taking a nap, waking up and staring for another three hours trying to think of an escape plan, Skinner got frustrated, and out of habit started throwing pebbles at the superintendent, then at the locomotive.

"SKINNER!" Chalmers sounded quite livid. He hoped his boss wouldn't figure out he'd been lying when he claimed all the times he'd thrown things at him to be accidents.

"Superintendent, I was just stretching my arms-" He droned

Chalmers interrupted him "I'm starting to think, no, I'm ninety nine percent sure you're doing that on purpose," Seymour opened his mouth to defend his morally unsound actions before being rudely cut off by his own brain catching up with the situation.

 

The steam powered aquamarine hued train engine was gone...

 

He yawned and turned towards his boss "well, that went much better than expected," a loud rumbling shook the cave, Chalmers was alarmed as Seymour's face morphed into the spitting image of pain,

"I'm really hungry," he said through clenched teeth. 

"Eh-but we had breakfast," Chalmers stuttered, signifying confusion.

"Yesterday!" Skinner grumbled from both mouth and stomach, surveying the pebbles and bits of dead grass appraisingly. 

The shorter of the two sighed and briefly considered mentioning the steamed hams, but decided against it as he didn't want to upset the man further when he was already in an almost murderous state.

He got up and cautiously meandered out of the cave, knowing that Seymour would probably follow, and if not? Good riddance.

They walked for a while until one of them spotted a birds nest on a low branch. They peered into the nest to find...

 

"Half a dozen eggs?"

"Yes, Seymour, there are eggs in a birds nest. I for one, am completely shocked and appalled," He mocked and would have said something about calling NASA if one of the eggs hadn't begun to crack.

"Oh egads, my omelette was ruined before it even began," Seymour wailed before Chalmers motioned for him to shut the fuck up. Bird watching happened to be one of his less questionable hobbies. The egg shook slightly. They leaned in further to observe the extra-ordinary phenomenon.

A tiny, red and featherless wing poked out from the shell. 

It chirped, once, twice. The superintendent grabbed on to Skinner's arm in an attempt to stop his heart from melting too much. Seymour barely flinched, too awed by the miracle of nature to notice. 

Another wing.

Two legs, the same reddish hue, broke through the shell simultaneously. The small bird walked the short distance across the nest and stood before them. 

It popped its little head out of the shell and-

"Do u no de waaa?" it said in a high pitched voice.

 

That wasn't a bird.

 

They were understandably horrified. Both jumped what felt like several miles into the air when a booming voice disturbed the already disturbed silence.

"HEY! GET A WAE FROM MAI NEST OR I SPIT ON U!" they looked up to see a fully grown echidna sprinting at them aggressively.

Seymour and Chalmers turned and booked it like a fully stocked library.

"WHY ARE U RUNNING?"

 

They would do well not to wander so close to the beach on their quest for food next time.


	5. Chapter 500 billion

There was one problem that simply refused to leave them alone.

Imminent starvation. Skinner hadn't been this hungry since he'd gotten stuck under a particularly heavy pile of newspapers. As he was thinking this, he spotted a mysterious echidna walking through the jungle. It was much taller than the others and wore a pink dress and wig.

He shared a look with Chalmers, they both nodded.

 

It took quite a beating, but it was finally dead. They had ambushed the discount platypus from both sides, it hadn't really stood a chance. They now only had two working eyes between them, Seymour had earned himself a black eye in the scuffle and the superintendent had been ruthlessly spit at, and it got in his eye, causing him to accidentally punch Skinner in the eye, thus the black eye on the principals side. 

Despite all this, it was actually the echidna who ended up worse off in the end.

Chalmers endeavoured to attach the dead mammal to a stick while Seymour gathered a pile of... more sticks and started a fire, which proved quite easy, most vegetation in Uganda being highly flammable. He glanced over his shoulder to see what was taking so long with their kill, only to find that nothing was there. What in the-?

He looked left, right, over his shoulder again, and then back in front only to see that his companion had just shoved the echidna onto the fire without putting it on a stick first.

Seymour gave him an imploring look, leant forward, tilted his head and squinted "what is wrong with you?" he asked for good measure.

"It broke," he shrugged, adding the two halves to the fire. The principal was none too happy with this reply.

"Superintendent, look around you," he said passive aggressively, gesturing towards the various fallen branches littering the floor.

"Hey now, you're burning all the good ones! Good sticks don't just grow on trees, Seymour!" the aforementioned Seymour chose not to dignify that with a response, instead checking on the Ugandan roast.

He gasped

"Don't say it." Chalmers held his hand up as if it would defend him from the words.

He un-gasped in disappointment. Well, if they had to eat a bit of ruined roast to survive, then what of it? They sat down by the fire and tore off a leg each. 

They only sustained first degree burns to their hands. 

The superintendent took a bite and hummed in approval "This cooking is roasted to perfection, you're fired," Seymour blushed, then did a double take.

"I'm fired?" he balked at the very notion that the event he'd been anticipating for the past sixty hours was actually happening. His eyes stung.

His former boss casually devoured the echidna leg. Skinner could not relate, it tasted like ash to him. 

"You're re-hired,"

"I'm retired?" Tears started to well up. Never in his life had he felt so insulted

Chalmers made a face, he couldn't stand deaf people "No, I said you're re-hired,"

Tears fell. 

"Oh... that's much worse," he would have been fine if not for the hiccup that followed.

"Why are you crying, Seymour?" his new-old boss asked with slight concern. Seymour didn't quite know himself

"Oh, no, I'm not crying... my eyes are just raining,"

Chalmers shrugged and turned back to the roast. Seymour shrugged and turned to the roast minutely, that was the only way he could actually face the roast more than he already had been.

 

It was an average luncheon, but at least they weren't starving anymore.

 

They pocketed the leftovers. Gary considered stopping to put the fire out, but Seymour knew more about fire safety than he did and _he_ was just walking away. After a moment of indecision, he took the pink dress and wig, then hurried after the principal.

"Seymour," he didn't yell as they had already encountered two kinds of lethal predator since they'd got there, and he did not want to see any thirds.

He jumped "Superintendent I was-" 

"Where are we going?" he asked, cutting Skinner's stammering short.

The darker haired man pointed in a random direction. A sharp incline. Chalmers nodded, high ground, that's exactly where they needed to go. Maybe Seymour wasn't as stupid as he'd thought? He clapped Skinner on the back and started for the hill. A few minutes later he turned to say something about the weather to his employee, but the odd look he was given made him pause. He retracted his hand.

"Superinten-"

"Skinner, I was just- uh, resting my arm on your back, carpal tunnel syndrome, you know?" he grimaced and tried to wave his left arm for emphasis but he couldn't feel it.

"Superintendent, is that a wig in your shirt or..?" confusion marred his face, then his eyes widened "do you have lycanthropy?"

Chalmers opened and closed his mouth several times as if to form a sentence. Crazy explanations were not his forte. He spotted a puddle a little ways off their chosen path and brightened. He hadn't had anything to drink in almost three days, a brilliant excuse to get out of this conversation.

 

He glanced over at Skinner, who had joined him at some point between his first and fourth liters. He knew he wasn't supposed to drink so much in one go after being severely dehydrated but who the fuck cared.

He soon noticed an unexpected quality to the water and couldn't help pointing it out "excellent, not a trace of spit," at this, Seymour spat out the water he had been drinking, having completely forgotten about the possible spit contents of various things in Uganda, and usually the best course of action was _not_ to trust Chalmer's judgement on such things.

The superintendent sighed. The spit to water ratio had risen to unacceptable levels, he couldn't drink it now, it'd be almost like getting first place in a competition he hadn't participated in. 

 

They stood up and continued on their hike, noting that the sun had already traveled quite far in the sky.

"Superintendent, I've been meaning to ask you a serious question," Seymour wrung his hands.

"Yes, Seymour?" he replied with a doubtful expression.

Skinner looked down at the floor and blurted "Chalmers... How many times a year does the sun set?" 

Gary deflated further "Three hundred and sixty four or five days a year- why are you even asking me this?" his eyes narrowed "Sey-A-are you trying to question my authority?!" 

Seymour was always trying to undermine him in small ways, even going so far as to blame the incidents on that Bert kid.

But never verbally. How could he ask a question like that 'seriously?'

The principal blanched "Superintendent, I would never-" Chalmers waved an arm, effectively shutting him up. He put the echidna arm away forcefully, 

"Talk to the hand, cause I'm not listening," Seymour frowned and nodded.

 

"Hand, what should I do? I think Superintendent Chalmers is going crazy but I don't have any medication on me!" he listened for a second "No, I couldn't do that! Think of the collateral damage..." Skinner shook his head in bemusement then gave the hand a high-five because he thought it looked lonely. 

He was half way through a game of patty cake when his boss cleared his throat and pointed at a large tree.

"What? Can't you see I'm busy?" 

"I don't need to see, anyway, it's almost pitch black out here and I'm tired" of being the third wheel. He left that part out.

"Okay. Why are you pointing at a tree?"

"Well Seymour, we're going to set it on fire," he said cheerfully, 

"Super-!"

"We're going to sleep up there, Skinner," he frowned. It was difficult to keep balance with his arm being swung around.

 

"...While it's on fire?" the principal asked, one eyebrow raised, the other lowered in order to convey maximum incredulity.

"Of course," Sarcasm was often a hit or miss deal with Seymour.

 

Climbing the tree turned out to be quite difficult due to a lack of lower branches. However, plenty of vines were conveniently strewn about the jungle, Chalmers smiled at this, he would often make ladders out of random vegetation (basically just flower crowns with the flowers cut off) to calm down whenever he got exceptionally mad at Skinner. He had a lot of practice. 

If the vines could support their weight was another question entirely, although he'd seen 300 pound gorillas swinging from similar shrubs. In cartoons, but what reason would a cartoon have to lie about physics?

 

Skinner watched as his boss tied the greenery together, a difficult feat considering the light level. Something didn't feel right, and he didn't wish for it to get in the way of their... amazing teamwork. 

"I really wasn't trying to question your authority," he said suddenly, not even bothering to feign sincerity this time, he had enough already.

The superintendent didn't look up "really?" he sounded unconvinced

Seymour nodded before remembering that he was being visually ignored "yes," he confirmed and quickly added "solar trajectories have always been a mystery to me,"

"I see," he still hadn't looked up from the vines, but he didn't appear to be frowning anymore. The principal took this as a good sign and relaxed slightly.

 

He soon realized that the atmosphere felt wrong on a level much deeper than their personal issues.

 

Within half an hour they had successfully climbed to the higher branches, where they would surely be safe. Echidnas and trains were confined to within seven meters from the ground, any higher and they would explode into roughly the shape of a piece of spaghetti, the air pressure too low for such primitive life forms to exist.

The hornet nest on the opposite side did look a little foreboding, but the two of them ignored it, too worn out to find a different eucalyptus. Besides, this tree's branches were wide enough that neither of them were in _too much_ danger of falling off.

 

Skinner stared off into the clear night sky. Chalmers had fallen asleep the instant his head hit the trunk, leaving him to his crippling insomnia.

A few minutes passed during which a gigantic star rose over the horizon. No, wait, that was the moon. He almost hadn't recognized it for a second there.

He counted sheep. Thirty seconds later he ran out of numbers. He compulsively checked to make sure the hams were sleeping. They were fine.

Breathing exercises were out of the question, partly because they included the word exercise.

The school principal started to lose all semblance of reality, and absolutely nothing was there to distract him from his dark intrusive thoughts.

 

Eventually he decided to smother himself with his pillow until he either fell unconscious or died, whichever happened first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow skinner maybe you need to start taking medication too


	6. Chaptwer 6 trillion

Gary woke up blearily from a disturbing vision of his past life as a teaspoon. His current life hadn't turned out very different if he were being honest...  
It was also getting progressively more difficult to breathe. He started to tell Seymour to wake up, when he saw something moving on the ground.

 

"SKINNER"

Skinner sat up abruptly "Intendentsuper!" Why-, Calves... on the windowsill!" his mind took a few extra seconds to start up, reminiscent of an old car, but when it did he quickly focused on his companion, what he'd heard had been a cry of fear, rather than one of anger.

"What? What?" he hissed, shaking his boss, before following the other's gaze downwards. He froze.

 

The train was back. Again.

It had found them somehow, again, perhaps by following the sparse trail of echidna bones, or maybe it really was psychic? Whatever it had done, enough was enough.

How long could they live their lives, constantly tormented by this steam powered demon? It would have to be gotten rid of, there was nothing for it.

Chalmers calmed down slightly, only shivering now. They were eight meters from the ground, after all. 

"Good lord, there is something seriously wrong with that steam engine," he said warily. The principal froze again.

His face slowly contorted into a devilish grin "huh, steam... Oh ho ho," Seymour quickly got to work, snapping twigs from nearby branches.

 

The train backed up slowly, confusing them for a few seconds, before rushing forward only to crash into the tree, almost causing them to fall off.

 

It was using its own face as a battering ram.

 

The locomotive had repeated this action several times, by then Seymour had gathered a decent pile of sticks. He took one of the twigs and swiped it on air, effectively setting it on fire. He added it to the pile; his weapon was forged.

He threw the flaming projectiles haphazardly, aiming for the mouth. Chalmers, who had been watching with rapt confusion up until this point, caught on and soon the azure locomotive was surrounded by a ring of not quite fire, but embers were still better than nothing. 

The last stick appeared to fall in slow motion, almost missing its target.

At first nothing happened. The train's face morphed into one of silent laughter. It had won.

 

But then a soft orange glow emitted from its mouth. Seymour tried not to laugh. The train hadn't noticed.

Eleven seconds was all it took.

Flames suddenly engulfed its disgusting lampblack encrusted teeth. Seymour laughed a lot, his brief stint as a mall Santa was finally paying off. 

Smoke poured out of the train, like an oven in the rain, it got everywhere, on the ground, in the sky, everywhere. The steam engine coughed, sputtered, and died. From train-lung failure, not to mention being set on fire and having its steam replaced with smoke. Skinner and Chalmers stopped for a quick victory dance before scrambling down the tree, as it had also caught fire.

 

Seymour paused "Did you hear that?" he asked after a beat.

"Hear what?"

"Oh, it's just that I could have sworn I heard my mother screaming at me for a second," he shrugged. They started walking.

Skinner paused again, "I really need to get back to Springfield,"

"I know, but so soon? You," he pointed incredulously "actually want to go back to class after class of ugly, ugly children? Did I mention hideous?"

"No," his haunted gaze passed right through the superintendent "I may have left the oven on." Chalmers paled. Leaving the house with the oven on... a _very_ serious crime, most offenders of that caliber were put on death row.

"And you're only telling me _now?_ " he facepalmed, If they ever wanted to return home, they would have to be quick about it. If they escaped or got rescued even years down the line, Skinner would return as a fugitive, and Chalmers would be incarcerated for mere association.

Seymour frowned "In my defence, I'm only _remembering_ now,"

They started backtracking the trail of echidna bones.

"So that's what they're teaching you in self defence class? If some- I dunno, some punk came up to you and started throwing deeply hurtful insults towards my person, you would just 'remember' at them?" Skinner thought the air quotations to be wholly unnecessary, and would have demonstrated what he'd actually learned in self defence, but this wasn't the time nor place for funk dancing, so he simply smiled and nodded.

 

Half the day had passed by the time they found the place where the echidna had been roasted. They could tell because a raging inferno was blazing through the jungle canopy and wasn't going to stop any time soon. They edged around it and continued retracing their steps to the foreboding cave in which they had made a great oversight in leaving the surfboard, their only means of escape.

And there it was, a few yards away in the underbrush right were they'd left it, the surfboard had stayed put as well. Skinner was, frankly, impressed. If he actually made it back to Springfield he would definitely send the students to Uganda, maybe then they'd learn how to stand still. Heck, if he sent the children to Uganda they could learn whatever they wanted as long as they didn't come back. The steamed hams could attend the school in their place, it would be like a utopia, but instead of falling apart like all the others it would remain impeccably perfect.

"Seymour," Chalmers said, disrupting his thoughts.

"Superintendent! I was just... uhh, stretching my legs on the ground, walking! Care to join me?" Gary shook his head, declining the offer only because he was already partaking in the walking.

"How are we going to get past those... things? We'll need a plan," 

Skinner shot him an odd look like the odd fellow he was "Aren't we just gonna sneak past them again?" Chalmers shot an odd look at the odd fellow.

"I'm sure they've caught onto your tricks by now," he replied, the principal smirked, stepping over the sharp teeth-like rocks at the mouth of the cave. 

"I'll bet you... _five_ dollars on the contrary, Superintendent,"

"That's... that's steep," he said wide eyed. Seymour nodded and carefully retrieved the surfboard. Phase one of their plan complete, they headed towards where they thought the nearest beach was, to make their not so daring escape. It would be a very careful escape if everything went according to plan.

Distantly they could hear one echidna screeching something about knowing the ways, it sounded just like the one that had chased them earlier.

Both shuddered in sync, not wanting another confrontation, they chose a slightly different 'way' to go.

 

Skinner was wondering why all the wildlife had suddenly gone deathly quiet, as they rounded a corner it all became much clearer; the beach! The only problem being that Echidnas covered it East to West and South to South-west, exceeding the number of stars in the galaxy by a grand margin. 

It seemed they were having some sort of dispute. The two men leaned forward a bit as if it would help them hear. It didn't.

They crept even closer to the shore.

Wailing assaulted their ears

"Dis all dat left!" a tearful little echidna brandished a ribcage that still had small chunks of meat hanging off of it. "We must put de Gathering on hold!"

"De Gathering of Bruudas WILL go on, kween... or no kween!" one of the blue ones shouted its dissent. Several others gasped.

"If dere is no kween den who can show us de wae?" the little one argued. Several others gasped. Seymour gasped. Chalmers put a hand over his mouth.

"I will show you de wae," the echidna that said this was promptly speared, spat on and thrown in the ocean for attempting to climb the ranks à la fake queen.

Clucking filled the air.

"I REAFUSE to be in a gathering of bruudas without da kween!" it stamped its foot, several more imitated it. 

 

Deciding that they'd heard enough, they resumed creeping through the vegetation, towards a darker area of the beach. It was all going fine until one of them stepped on a twig.

A snap resounded over the beach.

"Seymour,"

"It wasn't me, Gary"

"It wasn't me either,"

They looked down only to find that they'd both stepped on it. Usually this would their cue to make a wish, and boy did they wish they could be back in Springfield right now.

"I apologize for jumping to-," "No, no, I'm sorry-"

Their heartfelt remorse was ruthlessly cut off by the collective spit of a million inconsiderate discount platypodes. 

Seymour raised his arms in futile attempt to shield himself "If you'd just stop spitting on us, I'm sure we could find you a -new- queen!" he bargained.

"We what?" Chalmers exclaimed, Skinner elbowed him before he could say anything else. 

The spitting stopped temporarily as one of the echidnas stepped forward and gazed at them searchingly. After a few uncomfortable seconds it stepped back, seemingly satisfied with what it found, nodding its head in approval.

"You have until the fall of night to find de new kween!" and on that note, the tribe turned as a single unit towards the beach, hoping to find the way among the waves, leaving the strange yellow people to their promised task.

They walked back through the jungle with a purpose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> rip aquamarine steam powered locomotive engine


	7. chaptwer 7 hundred thousand million billion

They walked into the jungle with a purpose.

Thirty minutes later found Chalmers sitting on a fallen tree trunk, head in hands while an agitated Skinner paced around the small clearing they'd stumbled into.

"What are we gonna do?" He mumbled for the four hundredth time. They, or rather, he, had made a promise he couldn't keep to a tribe several trillion strong. 

They would hunt him down like a pack of gum in a hallway. 

He didn't want his life to amount to gum.

"Well Seymour, I can only begin hope that a bomb falls from the sky and puts us out of our misery. What were you thinking? No," he stopped and looked at Seymour as if he were about to take it all back "no, the question I should have asked is do you think? We could've just ran past those-" Skinner stopped paying attention at that point, mind far away in a distant memory.

One uneventful day at school, an unidentified student had left a web page open on a computer 'how to make bombs for dummies' the principal didn't actually consider himself a dummy, but he'd read it anyway instead of calling the police. 

He vaguely remembered the instructions. He would need four parts stick to every three parts bone to every one part stone. And a lot of sodium chloride mixed with plenty of dihydrogen monoxide, which would create an adequate volatile substance that happened to be perfect for making bombs.

He interrupted the superintendent's tirade, sending him to get the sticks and stones while he set to work measuring the other ingredients.

Chalmers returned shortly and placed the components next to the cheap platypus bones. He started to ask where Seymour had even learned to make bombs when one of the bones disintegrated.

"Wha-" 

"Shh."

"But-"

"No." 

The superintendent furrowed his brow but knew better than to ask at this point.

 

An hour and lots of hushed arguing, chemical burns and dressing up later, they had their results. Stood before them was a fake queen. Chalmers had reluctantly sacrificed the dress and wig, not that he'd made any plans to wear them himself or anything. That's what he kept insisting anyway.

 

There was one little problem with the 'queen,' it didn't have shoes. 

This would not be convincing enough. Even for the most primitive of echidnas, queens wore shoes, no exceptions. Skinner heaved a sigh, and retrieved the steamed hams that he'd been toting the whole journey.

"I'm gonna miss you guys... my only friends," he barely acknowledged the slighted glare sent to him and stuck the hams onto the stick-legs. This was it.

 

The two plus fake queen trudged back towards the beach, towards a fate of trying their best and expecting the worst. As they approached, several of the disgusting creatures rushed at them. The humans flinched but the echidnas simply recovered their queen reverently and backed away just as fast.

One of them stepped forward to offer its most humble and sincere gratitude "Thank you for procuring us a new kween," Clucking filled the air once more. 

Annoying but much better than spit.

The discount platypus turned to the others "de gathering of de bruudas will go on. Any who stray from de wae shall drop dead and we spit on dem." 

Applause met its speech.

 

Principal and superintendent gladly took this as permission to leave. 

The surfboard hit the water. 

They hit the water, that wasn't supposed to happen.

They tried again, this time it worked. The waves were abnormally calm, which guaranteed smooth surfing from there on out. Now all they needed was to get out of the blast radius, their fake queen could go off at any time if it happened to be anywhere near an open flame, and on the island of Uganda, all flames were open.

 

They had surfed all the way to the only cargo ship in miles, thankfully not manned by delinquent teenagers this time, when they heard the explosion. Skinner and Chalmers, being uncool folk, looked back towards the now distant island.

It had been completely decimated. They laughed more from relief than actual humor, and turned back to the cargo ship, only to find that it was now sinking at a rapid pace, the shock wave too much for its poorly constructed hull. 

They hadn't even felt anything. 

Seymour slumped down with a metaphorical cloud over his head as there were non in the actual sky. Of course they would end up having to surf all the way back to Springfield, how could he expect any other outcome? He did not look forward to another whole day cooped up on the too small surfboard. They would probably be eaten by sharks at any rate. At least Chalmers was there to snap him out of his depressing thoughts,

"GOOD LORD WHAT IS HAPPENING UP THERE?" he pointed to a green glow that had appeared in the night sky. Skinner heard ringing in his left ear. 

"An aurora..." of course. Sightings of auroras were disgustingly common at this latitude.

"...Aurora australis?" It always amazed him just how much one person could fail at geography.

"D'oh no, the aurora australis is that way," he said pointing southward, where the horizon glowed red as if a wildfire had spontaneously combusted on the ocean, "This, my friend, is an aurora _borealis,_ "

"A-aurora borealis?" there he went, asking far too many questions in Seymour's honest opinion.

"Yes," he explained faux-patiently.

"It's... beautiful," he hadn't taken his eyes off the northern lights for one second. Seymour adjusted his tie.

"Yes..." he trailed off, and after a moment, followed his friend's gaze up towards the aurora borealis.

 

Maybe another day of this wouldn't be so bad.

 

The next morning, Seymour woke up to find himself hanging upside down from the surfboard. He could easily tell because there was a distinct lack of air in his lungs, instead filled by a distinct abundance of water. Thankfully, the echidna spit had sunken to the bottom of the ocean by now. He hauled himself up with some difficulty as his blood was practically devoid of oxygen. 

He tried to take a breath, failed, emptied his lungs of water, then retried, succeeding.

The superintendent remained present, he noted, then frowned; that explains why he couldn't feel his legs, although it didn't excuse the fact that they were obviously not teddy bears. He let it slide since it was probably the only reason he hadn't drifted away outright. 

He gazed directly at the sun, it had already made it a third of the way through the sky. 

He'd never slept in this late OR seen the sun move that much in such a short space of time. Wow. After a few minutes he looked away from the sun, and saw nothing. Everything would be just fine. Chalmers woke up, Seymour couldn't see him but the quiet 'Myeh,' was as good as any visual information.

 

"Seymour,"

"Gary, I was just admiring the sun, lovely day, isn't it?" as he said this his vision started to clear, he could now see the bright blue sky, the bright blue water, the bright yellow shore-

His jaw dropped.

Chalmers appeared offended for a second, then noticing he was being looked past, turned at the same time Skinner recovered his voice.

"Land!" they yelled slightly out of time. They weren't very good at lip-syncing. A familiar seagull swooped down and tried to peck their eyes out, but they were too elated to care, merely swatting it absentmindedly into the water where it would later be devoured by a swarm of guppies.

The two of them let the tide wash them ashore, stepping onto the sand with no small amount of awe. Springfield was hell, but the only hell for them.

 

The superintendent pointed out the subatomic odds that they had washed up at almost the same place they departed from. Everything looked as it had when they'd first stepped off the school bus, the buildings still intact; not a single sign of water damage. Even the children were still there, and by the good graces of god, preoccupied. The school bus driver had gathered the them around a barrel fire, undoubtedly sharing some horrific, possibly true murder story, possibly committed by himself, that would leave most of the infants with debilitating nightmares for at least the next few years of their lives. 

Seymour took one look at them and grabbed his boss by the wrist, sneak-walking to the seafood restaurant he'd seen a few days ago, he was too tired and hungry to deal with those horrible brats right now, besides, Otto appeared to have everything under control. 

A blanket of dark clouds had blotted out the sun by the time they walked through the door. He thankfully noted that between him and Gary, about five dollars had survived their impromptu journey, only a little water damaged. It would probably cover the bill. Probably.

The restaurant already had several patrons and a general air of dinginess, even at the window seat that they'd situated themselves in. The rude stares they received for their shabby appearance went unnoticed by either of them. To others they looked as if they'd been lost at sea for years, possibly even days.

"I hope this place is okay with you," Seymour said with an abashed grin, remembering too late how much his friend hated seafood. Although now that he thought about it, it may have just been the school cafeteria that horrified him. 

"Of course," Chalmers raised a brow in confusion then paused "you know," he laughed awkwardly and faltered "your oven's still on,"

Seymour shrugged "can't it wait another hour?" he looked down at his hands.

"Do you miss them?" he didn't need to specify.

"Yes,"

the superintendent nodded and turned to gaze out the window.

Several minutes passed. He snickered at the scene outside, children scattering for cover as it started to rain buckets. It's always funnier when it happens to someone else.

Without any warning, Seymour boldly dragged him behind a menu. He reciprocated the gesture full heartedly, but thought the menu to be unwarranted, as he already knew exactly what he was going to order.

 

 

Steamed clams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well that was rushed.
> 
> you could probably tell, but at the end they actually decide to practice lip-syncing while they wait for some damn service, because they can actually recognize when they need to improve, and take appropriate action. 
> 
> unlike me. i just squint at my faults then ignore them


	8. Chaptwer 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seymour finally turns the oven off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kill me

Five dollars hadn't covered the bill. However, adjacent to the seafood restaurant was a pumpkin plantation, so getting any money at all had been a pleasant surprise for the small business.

 

Chalmers and Skinner walked the short distance down the street to the latter's house, having just finished the task of returning the children to their respective homes. When the concerned parents demanded as to why their offspring had been missing for half a week, Seymour simply replied that there had been a slight increase in traffic. No one could challenge his statement as no one in Springfield followed traffic reports.

After reaching the front step, Seymour motioned for the other to follow him, he then snuck through his door, crept past the stairs and into the kitchen. He sighed in relief, the oven was only partially melted. Coughing, he turned the kitchen appliance off. Just in time too, if the amount of smoke was anything to go by, it could have burst into flames within seconds had it been left running any longer. 

He tentatively pried open the oven door and looked inside, only to find a tar like sludge in the place of food. He couldn't even remember what he'd intended to cook, not even forensic science could identify what it used to be.

Seymour stowed away whatever it was in the fridge, with plans of taking it to school tomorrow so that the children would have something to eat other than diluted mud for lunch. He heard footsteps, soon followed by Gary walking in, almost clipping through the door in his haste.

"I called the fire department." 

It took him a second to process the absurd remark. He understood the words but not the reason. 

"Why?"

The superintendent simply gazed at him through the black smoke and coughed.

The younger man snickered mostly without condescension "we don't need them for a little smoke, we can just open the window, see?" He lifted the pane, causing smoke to billow out into the greater atmosphere. Anyone who happened to look towards his house at that moment would think that a volcano was erupting.

Realization and mortification dawned on Chalmers' face "there wasn't a fire, was there?" Calling the fire department for false alarms often resulted in a hefty fine and a possible jail sentence.

Seymour shook his head "no, but you still have plenty of time to cancel." 

"'Plenty of time'?"

"Yes, they only dispatch fifteen minutes after you call," his friend narrowed his eyes and backed out, presumably to re-call the fire department.

Seymour was all too happy to note the progress the smoke had already made in vacating his kitchen. He turned to vacate the kitchen himself when a sudden ear shattering bark made him jump violently, he peered out the window, only to be startled again.

There on the sidewalk stood Bart, who appeared to be walking his dog, or had been. 

Now he was just staring at Skinner blankly, the dictionary definition of 'creepy child' illustrated in reality.

"What's up with the smoke?" the boy asked finally. 

"Uh..." the principal's eyes darted around looking for some kind of answer "d'oh no, that isn't smoke, that's steam," 

Bart nodded sarcastically "that _steam's_ blacker than the mold growing on the walls in science class,"

"The groundskeeper is looking into it," he scowled "and I'm dyeing my curtains black... Blackout curtains," with that, he slammed the window shut, cutting the conversation short before Bart could make any more ridiculous accusations about the condition of his school. A muffled exclamation of 'ay caramba' made its way through the glass, despite his best efforts. 

 

A lot of things happened despite his best efforts.

 

He turned back around to find that Chalmers had returned, appearing much calmer than before.

"I think that was a success, a fire truck is _not_ on it's way and the operator only cussed at me seven times," Seymour's shoulders relaxed as he lessened their distance in a few easy steps.

"Only seven? She must be having a rough day," everything in his tone betrayed just how little he actually cared about the operator's abysmal Monday. His arms took precedence and were around the other before he'd even finished his sentence.

"You'd know all about rough days, Seymour,"

He honestly couldn't have stopped himself even if he wanted to, and if anyone _told_ him to then woe betide them because it would be akin to telling a heroin addict 'please stop shooting up in the playground, there are children watching,' it just didn't work, he knew this from experience. He was the one who'd said it that day and the bus driver had completely ignored him.

He was starting to understand, now, locked as he was in a different kind of vicious cycle. A language only they were sharing.

 

A few minutes later he tilted his head back to break away from it, his lungs would surely collapse otherwise. The superintendent followed him. He craned his neck further and further, to the point where it would definitely snap if he pushed his luck. Realizing he'd have to take a different approach, he sharply turned his face to the side, effectively breaking the trance. They both gasped for air, looking very peculiar standing in the middle of a kitchen, in such proximity that they couldn't be distinguished as single entities.

Seymour used his newfound breath to laugh, the thought to step back hadn't even crossed his mind. The most practical ideas were always had in hindsight, after all.

Now that his eyes were open he wondered why everything had turned orange. He looked out the window to locate the source of the strange light.

The sun was setting _again._ He couldn't wrap his head around it, that something so beautiful it should only happen once in a lifetime could happen three hundred and sixty five times a year. The scene was marred only by the garish Krusty Burger across the street, and also by Bart, who was lying on the side of the road having a seizure of some kind while his brown dog chased his own tail.

When Seymour's gaze returned to its rightful place he was slightly shocked to find tired eyes staring back at him.

 

He felt the same way.

 

Skinner herded his companion out of the kitchen and into the living room. He didn't even think about going upstairs, not wanting to disturb his mother, he didn't know if she was actually up there or if she was at the bank playing dye-pack roulette again. There was no way to know, save for _checking,_ and he had no intention of doing that. They would just have to sleep on the couch.

 

"I can't believe he lost the lamb sauce, Seymour" Gary mumbled. Seymour nodded absently and asked himself why he'd switched the television on in the first place. It _had_ been his usual routine after work, but his usual routine had just been destroyed beyond repair. 

Thankfully the volume was set quite low, so at the very least he would have a fighting chance of getting some sleep. More fighting than chance, with the sound of his friend criticizing the chefs on TV, but he managed... Eventually.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and now... to tack on an extra chapter!
> 
> tbh i just wanted to see if i could write them make out in the same style as all the other gay stuff in this godforsaken fic i'm so sorry, i don't even know how this chap reached 1000 words, but no one's going to read past the first sentence in chapter one anyway so i can write whatever cringe i want here and no one will be the wiser. 
> 
> since i'm talking to myself, for future reference, me  
> 1\. don't trust memes about red anthropomorphic animals, they have SIDS  
> 2\. or just don't make memes part of the main plot in general  
> 3\. make a story outline or something. this is terrible, even for crack  
> 4\. get better at formatting ples  
> 5\. there were many more valuable lessons in 'what not to do' that i learned from this fic but i've forgotten... it's 2am so... bye


End file.
